Leather Goddesses of Phobos

Leather Goddesses of Phobos was an Infocom title published in 1986. Labeled a "sex farce" by its creators, the game bears the unmistakable comedic style of popular Infocom author Steve Meretzky. The game is done in a science fiction style, but not the "hard" science fiction more typically used in Infocom titles such as Starcross or Suspended.

Notable both for its mild "naughtiness" and unusual feelies (which include both a 3-D comic book and a scratch-and-sniff card to be used at various points in the game), it went on to become a top-five seller for Infocom.

Contents

How It Begins

The place: Upper Sandusky, Ohio. The time: 1936. The beer: at a nickel a mug, you don’t ask for brand names. All you know is that your fifth one tasted as bad as the first.

Notable Features

The game subtly determines the sex of the player in the first few moves. The opening scene is in a bar, and the player's character has a sudden, powerful urge to urinate. The game deduces the player's sex according to whether they head for the men's room or the ladies' room and then tailors the game appropriately. For instance there is a "sidekick" NPC who is matched to the presumed sex of the player. Also the game includes some relatively mild sexually-suggestive encounters with the opposite sex.

The game allows the player to select from three different "naughtiness levels", offering a sexually explicit ("Lewd") game, a merely titillating ("Suggestive", the default) game, or a family-friendly ("Tame") game. The basic puzzles are the same in any mode, just described differently.

The software was not copy-protected but was distributed with a set of "feelies" which contained important clues to completing the game.

Another interesting feature was the inclusion of a Boss Key that displayed what looked like a Visicalc-like spreadsheet, so that if the boss walked by, the player might seem to be really working, instead of playing a game. However, looking closely at the spreadsheet gave the secret away as it included some rather "unique recreational items," such as leather whips.